


Without the lights (I see it all)

by nationalrebellion



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Abuse, Abusive Relationships, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Jughead is briefly mentioned, Mental Abuse, Panic Attacks, Self-Acceptance, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Self-Love, Therapy, Unhealthy Relationships, Verbal Abuse, archie comics - Freeform, toxic realtionships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-28
Updated: 2018-12-28
Packaged: 2019-09-28 08:55:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17179874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nationalrebellion/pseuds/nationalrebellion
Summary: In the beginning, it was a wonderful, free-falling relationship which Betty Cooper swore spilled out love everywhere they went. It wasn't until she was buried nearly 6 feet in the ground that she realized she was in too deep.That girl never stood a chance after that dark dance with the waves.





	Without the lights (I see it all)

**Author's Note:**

> Please read the tags first before you start this. Much Love.

_"She waltzed her way into the sea_  
_I don't know what I'd do_  
_if you leave"_  
  
Everyone thought Betty waltzed her way into her relationship like it was as easy as gracefully entering a world of love on a whim. She’d describe it as more of a force she couldn’t fight. She hadn’t come to love him effortlessly. Instead, she had somehow choreographed her way into self-destruction and an abusive relationship.  
  
She had become so emotionally dependent on her partner that she ended up not being able to see the destruction he left in his wake. But she didn’t want to get away. Sometimes she even felt like she _needed_ to get deeper and deeper into the relationship, tarnishing it and herself more and more with time.    
  
Betty remembered feeling drained as she watched him take away all of her light, all of the good aspects of her life until all she saw was darkness. To her, the world had become a dark place, her own personal hell, and she didn’t know if she could ever escape. She remembered being under the power of her partner, remembered the sinking feeling as her world went dark just like his. By the time she had realized what was happening to her, to them, it felt like it was too late to try and change it.  
  
_"Watch the torches all go out_  
_One at a time_  
_The world gets darker every night_  
_Cause I see it all_  
Without the lights"  
  
Betty and her boyfriend Tristan had been shopping at their local store. He needed a gift for his little sister and asked for her help. Everything was going well. So goddamn well. Until she saw that one particular gift. She thought now that if she had chosen differently, then maybe she could have prevented the events that unfolded afterward. She could remember the words he spewed in such a venomous voice--they played in her head over and over like a broken record.

They had been back in New York just in time for Tristan’s little sister’s birthday. As much as Betty loved Chicago, she couldn’t deny that she missed her small town of Riverdale. Betty had picked up a beautiful music box that made her think of her own sister, Polly. The trinket played _Fur Elise_ , song Betty loved, and she believed Tristan's sister would love the gift, too. However, her hopes had been shattered when she presented it to him and his cruel words slipped out like a second skin.  
  
_"I don't even know why I bothered asking you to help me. She would fucking hate this. What's wrong with you? I swear, most days you're just so goddamn useless." Betty felt her heart sink and her chest tighten, suffocating her immediately. Her mind went into overdrive, the panic starting as thin as the cellophane wrapping on the trinkets in the shop. She could claw her way out of cellophane; it wasn't until the cellophane thickened to sheets of ice that she couldn't chop away at. Every limb was surrounded and it crept higher and higher until she was completely lost beneath it._

Betty was becoming erratic, a danger to those in the store. In the height of her panic, she accidentally broke the music box, dropping it right where she stood. She didn't know when, but someone had called the cops on her, presumably unaware of her inner turmoil. To an onlooker, she knew she looked unhinged without reason. In court, the judge told her she had even been screaming, though she doesn’t remember making any noise. Betty had been arrested for public disturbance, cuffed and humiliated, but the worst part was that Tristan made absolutely no effort to help her, to reason with the cops. No, he remained on the sidelines with everyone else that gawked and stared as if they'd never seen someone have a panic attack before.  
  
When Betty had been processed and booked, she sat in a cell with tears streaming down her face, wondering where Tristan was. She was sure he wouldn’t leave her there. Well, mostly sure. She told herself over and over that he would be there to bail her out and they would go home and make up. Betty would apologize for making him look bad in public and swear to try and control her panic attacks.

She had used her one phone call on Tristan, hopefulness in her voice when he picked up.

_Soon, this nightmare will be over and everything will go back to normal_ , she thought as the phone rang.

_“Tristan?”_

_“What, Betty?”_

_“Are you on your way to come bail me out? It’s really lonely here.”_

_“No. That stunt you pulled in public? You embarrassed me, Elizabeth. You know what? I’ve had it with you and I’m done. We’re done. Goodbye.” She listened to Tristan hang up the phone and for the second time that day, Betty felt her heart drop to her stomach as the phone slipped from her grasp. Goodbye? How could he do this to her?_

Now she stood in front of the judge, feeling terribly numb, horribly lost, and ultimately confused. She stood next to her court-appointed lawyer, listening to the bailiff read out her case to the judge.

“In the case of The State of New York v. Elizabeth Cooper, the defendant is charged with one count of criminal mischief in the fourth degree and one count of disorderly conduct.” God, that sounded terrible and more serious than Betty would have thought it to be. She felt like she was some criminal, even though she most definitely was not. She was just a girl going through a tough time.

“Miss Cooper, would you like to explain what happened?” Betty, who had been staring at her nails the entire time, jerked her head up and made eye contact with an old man who she swore had the kindest eyes she’d ever seen. Sucking in a deep breath, Betty blinked a few times, trying to rearrange her thoughts.

“Your Honor, I make no excuses for the way I acted. I wish I could tell you what was happening, but the truth is I can’t really explain it because I don’t understand it completely myself. I had a panic attack and I felt like I was sinking or like the floor beneath me was going to collapse. The music box I broke had fallen out of my hand. I swear to you, I… there were no malicious intents.” _A good speech_ , Betty thought to herself. She just hoped that maybe the judge would see she wasn’t a terrible person. Even if that’s how she currently felt.

“Miss Cooper, seeing as you've never been arrested before and have shown a history of mental illness, we are willing to drop the original misdemeanor charge to an additional count of disorderly conduct as long as you agree to see a state licensed therapist once a week for at least six months. After that is completed, and the court feels as though you are in a better state, we are willing to have it be an acquittal in contemplation of dismissal. Meaning as long as the sanctions are followed and there are no additional arrests and pending no further legal trouble in that six months, the violations will be acquitted as if they never happened. Do you understand?”

“I understand. Thank you.” The thundering boom of the judge’s gavel caused Betty to flinch just the slightest bit. She didn’t know what she was supposed to do, or where she was supposed to go. Clearly, Tristan was out of question, even if Betty wasn’t yet willing to accept that.

\----  
  
"In our last meeting, we talked about how sometimes the one who is being abused is often blinded by the dependency on the abusive partner to see what may be obvious to everyone else around them." Betty sat across from an older woman, Dr. Steeler, who had a notepad resting in her lap filled with numerous notes from all of her preceding sessions. Betty furrowed her eyebrows and focused her attention on the palm of her hands where four crescent-shaped scars looked back at her like blinking eyes Her mind was reeling as she struggled to keep her emotions in check.  
  
For nearly four months, the sessions would go like this: Dr. Steeler would start the conversation and Betty would offer one or two-word responses as an attempt to push the woman away. She didn't even want to be here. but unfortunately she had been court-ordered to attend therapy and somewhere down the line, the nature of her relationship with her boyfriend had been revealed.  
  
"I believe that you were in need of affection and you would search for it in him. I think you may have been so engrossed that you never noticed how much he was harming you." On her notepad, Dr. Steeler had written down _‘It was as if she were asking her abusive partner to pull her even deeper into trouble, to make her more damaged, never realizing the masochist aspect of it, to feel closer to him.'_

_He isn’t abusive_ , Betty had argued on Tristan’s behalf countless times. She knew it was a useless fight, that the doctor had already made up her mind. But she needed Tristan in a way she’d never needed anyone before. And yeah, maybe it wasn’t the healthiest relationship she could be in, but he had somehow still loved her. No matter how much his words hurt, he didn’t mean it and he was what she thought she needed. At least until she had finally discovered the error of their relationship in what she thought was pure love. _No more excuses_ , she finally told herself that session four months in.  
  
_Reach up your hand and pull me down. Down_  
_Pull me down. Down. Down_  
_Pull me down. Down. Down._  
_Pull me down. Down. Down._  
_Pull me down. Down. Down._  
_Pull me down._  
  
Betty chewed at her bottom lip, and unlikely habit she had recently developed to try and stop opening wounds on her hands. Generally, she rarely spoke because in her experience; talking led to trouble. But for some reason today, someone's voice was ringing in her head, a voice she had long forgotten. You're so much stronger than all the white noise.  
  
She remembered the day Jughead Jones, sweet and wonderful Jughead Jones, had stood in front of her and gave her all of the support she needed whenever she was going through a difficult time. Betty couldn't understand how or why she had decided to leave him behind in Riverdale to follow Tristan four states away as he chased his dreams. Perhaps, at the time, she believed with all of her heart, that it was pure, adoring love. Through all of the trials and tribulations, she finally realized that he was never the one for her and that he never cared, but Betty was so blinded by his words and how he always knew the right thing to say.  
  
Betty looked up at Dr. Steeler with tears staining her porcelain face. She drew in a shaky breath, trying to calm her nerves as she wiped away the fallen tears.

"I get it now. It's just so hard because for years I've been blaming myself, wondering what it was that I did and how I could fix it. I never focused on myself or cared about my wellbeing. I let him suck out any shred of good that I had in my life. I don't know how I'll get that back, that light, that goodness, but I refuse to continue to let him have any power over me."  
  
"I'm very pleased that you've come to this conclusion, Betty. I know that it has been a long and hard road which you had to endure. However, I believe that I should let you know I'm very proud of your progress. You deserve all of the goodness that comes your way. I have an assignment for you. I want you to write a letter to Tristan, but what you do with it is your choice. In your letter, I want you to write down your emotions, your fears, and hopes. Do you think you could do that?”

“Um, I think I can try.”

“That’s all I ask of you, Betty. Now, unfortunately, our session is up, but I will see you next week and we will continue some of the exercises that we’ve been doing.” Dr. Steeler stood from her seat and Betty followed thereafter. Betty smiled softly at the woman and nodded, feeling genuinely thankful for the help that she had been given.

Hours later, Betty sat at her desk in the small apartment that she lived in by herself. It wasn’t much, but it was home and Betty had worked every day for it, providing for herself and becoming stronger, not to mention more independent since the day that Tristan had shattered her heart. She stared down at the blank sheet of paper, a pen in her hand and her breathing shaky. There was so much she wanted to say, so much she _needed_ to say. After what felt like an eternity, the pen hit the paper and words that Betty had been harboring for years flowed out in a steady stream.

 

_Tristan,_  


_I gave you a sense of deep love freely, yet you assumed that you had taken it from me with dominance. I saw our relationship as cooperation, yet you only saw manipulation instead of helping words as if we were in this bizarre, live game of chess. I do not think you could fathom how much it broke my heart to realize that you saw a cold war instead of sweet love. For it was all in your head, a simple paranoia._

_Truthfully, all I ever wanted to do was love you and bring happiness, to heal where you were hurt. Everything I gave, I gave freely from my soul, yet you thought that you were entitled to all I ever had and more. In a way, you were like a guest at a restaurant who, because he paid the bill, thought he was entitled to be rude to the chef. But what you never seemed to grasp was that love is more akin to cooking one another meals for the joy for feeding the other, the coziness that comes from nurturing being the reward._

_What you saw and what you felt wasn’t love at all. I see that now. I am so sorry that I failed to teach you, yet it was also your duty to learn._

_Perhaps, I should have seen the signs. How you were cold, how you never took initiative connecting with words or physical love. I should have seen how you took credit not only for every good thing you achieved but for all of my own achievements as well. I do not think you know how much I wish you had learned humility, humbleness, and kindness. How I wanted you to see the happiness that comes from feeling like part of a team, one where each member is boosted by the other, proud of the other’s success._

_You see, with love comes joy to give. It means the difference between feeling like a valued, helping friend and a slave; it is the magic ingredient that seems to make everything wonderful. I fear that you will never see that, but how I pray that you do. What you showed me was indifference to my pains, refusal of my emotional needs, all while demanding resilience and compliance on my behalf. What we shared together was not love. You may have won the battle, but you lost the war._

_It has been a very difficult few months for me, Tristan. But, to get better, I must leave you behind. Maybe that is harsh of me, but I know I am to endure a rocky road to my “bad place,” a personal hell, in the days and weeks to come. In truth, though, it is the only road to my “good place,” my best chance and shot at a better, more fulfilling life. And when I get there, with any luck, perhaps I will experience true and real love._

_Despite how much you hurt me, I still hope you find your way too, that you learn how to truly love instead of hiding behind that mask of what you had supposed friendliness was. Maybe one day you will see the error of your ways and treat the next person you fall in love with like they are a beautiful light that only brightens your life._  
  
_Goodbye, for I know what I will do now that you’re gone. I am free and I am safe. Slowly, each and every passing day, I become stronger and more vibrant. I know that I am not useless, that I have a purpose and I’ll continue to make it on my own._

_-Betty_

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to Lyss (breathewords), Tori (toryb), and Summer (SummerRaine14) for beta-ing this work for me! You guys are absolutely incredible!


End file.
